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1. ‘PN has a sympathy problem’

With no major issues on the level of independence or EU accession dominating Maltese politics these days, Debono argued that the sympathy of political parties vying for power plays an important role.

“Imagine two restaurants, one’s food is good and the other’s is so-so. If the second restaurant has kind staff and a nice atmosphere, while the first one is arrogant, wants to pick fights with everyone and split hairs, you would probably consider dining at the second one,” Debono pointed out. “Politics is the same.”

He said that while some people might point at government scandals as a reason to vote PN over PL, the electorate had their say over issues such as the Electrogas deal in the 2017 and 2022 elections.

“PN kept raising this issue and it kept losing elections by 40,000. So shouldn’t it raise these issues? No, go ahead and raise them but, in my opinion, the electorate has had enough of hearing more of the same.”

2. Nostalgia for the ‘glory days’

Debono warned that the PN’s constant pining for the ‘glory days’, when the likes of Eddie Fenech Adami were in charge, is holding it back from making progress.

“Obviously, there were characters in the PN who helped Malta progress significantly, but it’s like a football team that is still happy with the five cups it won in the past, even though another team has come along and won 20 trophies.”

“PN must get it into its head that its best of times are yet to come and not remain stuck in the past.”

3. Lingering pain from the Gonzi era

Debono served as a PN MP during Lawrence Gonzi’s tumultuous 2008-2013 administration and warned that some pain from those days still lingers on over a decade later.

“The 2008 election was the PN’s hardest election out of the five it won, because it had already been in government for 25 years. Some argue that it would have been better for PN if it had lost that election [rather than win by 1,500 votes] but I cannot agree. How can a political party ever say that it would rather lose an election than win one?”

“The problem was that the change promised by PN before 2008 didn’t take place and I dare say that one of PN’s current problems is that this sentiment still lingers on.”

4. Picking fights with too many people

Debono warned that PN had adopted an extremely aggressive strategy against former loyalists who had started getting close to PL following the 2013 election.

“Without getting into the specifics, PN had a structure and a mechanism to fight with people, including businesspeople who had stuck with it through 25 years in government,” he said.

“These people were considered fine so long as they were cushy with PN, but as soon as they started working a bit with PL, there was a mechanism that tried to destroy them. This alienated and sidelined many people, and you’d be surprised at what a long time it can take for political wounds to heal.”

The way forward

Debono said that he is not advocating PN tone down its criticism against government, a lot of which he said is justified. However, he said MPs should focus more effort on meeting people who were hurt by the party in some way and trying to heal the wounds.

He referred to a recent debate on his Facebook wall between Edward Debono, a lawyer who helped Adrian Delia mount a successful legal challenge against the Vitals deal, and Jonathan Dingli, an Mqabba councillor who resigned from the PN.

“Edward Debono began speaking to him about Vitals, but Jonathan Dingli responded that while he understands it is an issue, he had other unrelated issues with PN and that the party hurt him.”

“Vitals is an issue, but you cannot impose what people are interested in. If you want to reach a wide consensus and win an election, what are you going to tell those people who aren’t interested in Vitals enough that it will sway them to vote PN?”

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